Food for Thought: Be safe around any egg

Click inside for the weekly food rail, with egg-safety tips, an easy corn chowder recipe and more. Or check out these links:

Staff reports

The American Dietetic Association offers the following tips for egg safety at all times:

Buying

Choose a carton that is cold. Check to see eggs are clean and aren't broken or cracked.
To reduce the amount of time eggs are out of refrigeration, pick them up toward the end of your shopping trip.

Storing

Store eggs in the original packaging in the coldest part of the refrigerator. Do not use the pre-made egg cups in the door where eggs are susceptible to warmer air from the door opening and closing.
Do not keep raw eggs for more than three weeks in the refrigerator.

Cooking

Whether you're boiling, frying or scrambling eggs, make sure the yolks and whites are firm, not runny.
Never eat raw eggs. This includes raw cookie dough and cake batter.

Chicken sausage. Who-da thunked it? The girthy sausages are seasoned like traditional sausage, but don’t have all the fat and calories. I especially enjoyed the mild Italian, a lean and zesty flavor that was delicious both baked and grilled.

Saimi Bergmann: SPATULA SIDEWAYS

The garlic-flavored chicken sausage browned nicely on the grill, retained a commendable juiciness, and had a pleasing texture, but holy salt lick, Batman! Three glasses of water later, I started wondering if perhaps it was garlic powder that contributed to the salty burn. So I bought the mild Italian flavor links. Ahhh, now that’s more like it. Same juiciness and texture without the salt overload.

-- The Repository

Food Quiz

The Jewish people produce several distinctive leavened breads. This one, popular on the Sabbath, is a braided egg loaf.
A. Challah
B. Kugel
C. Hamentaschen
D. Bagel

-- www.funtrivia.com

(Answer is at bottom of column)

Wise to the Word: Fuzzy melon

This is not part of the fuzzy series of cocktails. It’s the winter melon, almost as popular as watermelon in Asian cuisines. Its medium green skin is covered with a hairlike fuzz, which must be peeled. Underneath is a mildly flavored flesh that takes on the flavor of whatever it’s cooked with. You’ll find them in Chinese soups and stir fries.

-- The Repository

Number to Know

421: In 2008, bakers and volunteers from Jana Bakers LLC in Doha, Qatar, created the longest pita bread ever made at 421 and a half feet long, according to Guinness World Records. The original goal was to make a pita that was 328 feet long, but the bakers evidently got on a roll, so to speak.

The Dish On …

“Salt: A World History,” by Mark Kurlansky
It’s the only rock we eat, and though it can kill us if we eat too much of us, it’s also necessary to life. Kurlansky details the relationship between humans and the food additive that may have made civilization possible. Without salt, there would have been no way to preserve food for long sea voyages. Some recipes are sprinkled in as well.

-- Amazon.com

From the Beer Nut’s Blog: Homebrew contest winners

When I announced the first Beer Nut Homebrewing Contest two months ago, I challenged homebrewers to submit their best beers to the contest so I could see what they could do.

And Aug. 22, they showed me they can do a lot. In all, 59 people from Massachusetts and Connecticut entered the contest with all kinds of styles - IPAs, pilsners, stouts and a host of off-the-wall beers.

The winner was Chuck Mryglot, whose Bavarian weiss took the grand prize. Mryglot said he was "blown away" to find out that he won. He has been homebrewing for 20 years, grows his own hops and usually serves his own beers on tap at his home bar, but he has never entered a homebrewing contest.

To read more from the Beer Nut, visit http://blogs.townonline.com/beernut/